Is an app the answer?
One questions I get a lot is “should I get an app?” (paraphrased: “should I add an app to my business”). Of course, the answer is “it depends”. Like any business decision, deciding whether your business needs an app or not is similar to assessing whether you should increase the marketing budget or buy new equipment. You have to size the opportunity, the costs, and the risks to reach a conclusion. So what could this process look like?
Is increasing revenue your goal? Mobile is well suited for making it very easy for customers to make small frequent purchases. Does iTunes or the AppStore ring a bell? It is amazing that software is sold and bought for the price of a chocolate bar. Mobile could also allow you to reach a customer segment that you otherwise would not. For example, I have not owned a television set since 2011, so I will not discover products and services that are only promoted through television.
Another approach is to use mobile technology to decrease costs. For example, an app can be used to make it easier for customers to leave raving feedback in various online review portals like TripAdvisor or Yelp, increasing your online visibility. It can also be used to catch and fix bad customer experiences before they make their way into these review sites and damage the reputation you have built. By increasing the quantity and quality of your online reviews you increase the visibility of your business and the likelihood that new customers bump into you. Prompting users for feedback can be easily implemented on digital only products and services and it can also be prompted after visits to brick and mortar stores with iBeacons.
Your first app doesn’t need to be a huge expensive project. Most use cases do not require complex and intricate animations or multimedia experiences, the things where native applications excel. Functional use cases can be effective using a mobile web app approach, which is a cross-platform and a lower maintenance approach than native apps. After you’ve proven the value that mobile can deliver for your business, you can take your app to the next level with a native application.
The process of creating a mobile application is itself valuable. Because the mobile use case has to be a simple one, it can force prioritization and de-cluttering of the user experience to yield a more streamlined and effective service. The mobile use case can also be a smaller and more frequent use case that helps your brand stay top of mind as your customers go through their day.
There is no doubt that mobile is exciting and is financially attractive. But before getting started, make sure that you identify and plan for the short and long-term investments that you will need to make to get your mobile service established.
